Structured abstracts Emerald introduced structured abstracts to all journals in 2005. This development was undertaken as part of the strategy of continuous improvement in the delivery and dissemination of papers. Use of structured abstracts ensures that better information is supplied and that there is more consistency across the journals and database. Ultimately, readers and researchers searching the database are more likely to access the paper when the abstract provides useful information. In the past, author-written abstracts were very variable both in terms of content and quality. Structured abstracts ensure we no longer have this problem. In an electronic environment, abstracts are more important that they have ever been. Sometimes this “snippet” is the only thing a reader or researcher will see and it is the one chance we have of persuading them to download the full text of the paper. Structured abstracts act like signposts, they provide: Consistency and clarity. Much ea...